The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Astilbe plant, botanically known as Astilbe hybrida and hereinafter referred to by the name ‘Spotlight’.
The new Astilbe plant is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Noorden, The Netherlands. The objective of the breeding program was to create new long-flowering Astilbe plants with attractive foliage and flower coloration.
The new Astilbe plant originated from a cross-pollination made by the Inventor in 2003 in Noorden, The Netherlands, of an unnamed proprietary seedling selection of Astilbe chinensis×Astilbe arendsii, not patented, as the female, or seed, parent with Astilbe arendsii ‘Weisse Gloria’, not patented, as the male, or pollen, parent. The new Astilbe plant was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a single flowering plant within the progeny of the stated cross-pollination in a controlled greenhouse environment in Noorden, The Netherlands in 2005.
Asexual reproduction of the new Astilbe plant by divisions in a controlled environment in Noorden, The Netherlands since January, 2006, has shown that the unique features of this new Astilbe plant are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.